The Annotated Milton: Complete English Poems (142 page)

Or work redemption for mankind, whose sins’

Full weight must be transferred upon my head.

Yet neither thus disheart’ned or dismayed,

The time prefixed
⁶⁵⁸⁸
I waited, when behold

The Baptist (of whose birth I oft had heard,

Not knew by sight) now come, who was to come

Before Messiah, and his way prepare.

I, as all others, to his baptism came,

Which I believed was from above, but he

Straight knew me, and with loudest voice proclaimed

Me him (for it was shewn him so from Heav’n)—

Me him whose harbinger
⁶⁵⁸⁹
he was, and first

Refused on me his baptism to confer,

As much his greater, and was hardly
⁶⁵⁹⁰
won.
⁶⁵⁹¹

But as I rose out of the laving
⁶⁵⁹²
stream

Heav’n op’ned her eternal doors, from whence

The Spirit descended on me like a dove,

And last—the sum
⁶⁵⁹³
of all—my Father’s voice,

Audibly heard from Heav’n, pronounced me His,

Me His belovèd Son, in whom alone

He was well pleased. By which I knew the time

Now full,
⁶⁵⁹⁴
that I no more should live obscure,
⁶⁵⁹⁵

But openly begin, as best becomes

Th’ authority which I derived from Heav’n.

“And now by some strong motion I am led

Into this wilderness, to what intent

I learn not yet. Perhaps I need not know,

For what concerns my knowledge God reveals.”

So spoke our morning star, then in his rise,

And looking round on every side beheld

A pathless desert, dusk
⁶⁵⁹⁶
with horrid shades.
⁶⁵⁹⁷

The way he came, not having marked return,

Was difficult, by human steps untrod,

And he still on was led, but with such thoughts

Accompanied of things past and to come

Lodged in his breast as well might recommend
⁶⁵⁹⁸

Such solitude before choicest
⁶⁵⁹⁹
society.

Full forty days he passed—whether on hill

Sometimes, anon
⁶⁶⁰⁰
in shady vale, each night

Under the covert
⁶⁶⁰¹
of some ancient oak

Or cedar to defend
⁶⁶⁰²
him from the dew,

Or harbored
⁶⁶⁰³
in one cave, is not revealed.

Nor
⁶⁶⁰⁴
tasted human food, nor hunger felt,

Till those days ended. Hungered then at last

Among wild beasts. They at his sight grew mild,
⁶⁶⁰⁵

Nor sleeping him nor waking harmed. His walk

The fiery serpent fled and noxious
⁶⁶⁰⁶
worm,

The lion and fierce tiger glared
⁶⁶⁰⁷
aloof.
⁶⁶⁰⁸

But now an agèd man in rural weeds,

Following, as seemed, the quest of some stray ewe,

Or withered sticks to gather, which might serve

Against a winter’s day when winds blow keen

To warm him, wet returned from field at eve,

He
⁶⁶⁰⁹
saw approach, who first with curious eye

Perused him, then with words thus uttered spoke:

“Sir, what ill chance hath brought thee to this place,

So far from path or road of men, who pass

In troop or caravan? For single
⁶⁶¹⁰
none

Durst ever, who returned, and dropped not here

His carcass, pined
⁶⁶¹¹
with hunger and with drought?

I ask the rather, and the more admire,

For that
⁶⁶¹²
to me thou seem’st the man whom late

Our new baptizing prophet at the ford

Of Jordan honored so, and called thee Son

Of God. I saw and heard, for we sometimes

Who dwell this wild,
⁶⁶¹³
constrained
⁶⁶¹⁴
by want, come forth

To town or village nigh (nighest is far),

Where aught we hear, and curious are to hear,

What happens new. Fame
⁶⁶¹⁵
also finds us out.”

To whom the Son of God:

“Who brought me hither

Will bring me hence. No other guide I seek.”

“By miracle he may,” replied the swain.
⁶⁶¹⁶

“What other way I see not, for we here

Live on tough roots and stubs,
⁶⁶¹⁷
to thirst inured

More than the camel, and to drink go far—

Men to much misery and hardship born.

But if thou be the Son of God, command

That out of these hard stones be made thee bread,

So shalt thou save thyself, and us relieve

With food, whereof we wretched seldom taste.”

He ended, and the Son of God replied:

“Think’st thou such force in bread? Is it not written

(For I discern thee other than thou seem’st),

Man lives not by bread only, but each word

Proceeding from the mouth of God, who fed

Our fathers here with manna? In the mount

Moses was forty days, nor ate nor drank,

And forty days Elijah without food

Wandered this barren waste. The same I now.

Why dost thou, then, suggest to me distrust,
⁶⁶¹⁸

Knowing who I am, as I know who thou art?”

Whom thus answered th’ arch-fiend, now undisguised:

“’Tis true, I am that Spirit unfortunate

Who, leagued with millions more in rash revolt,

Kept not my happy station, but was driv’n

With them from bliss to the bottomless deep.

Yet to that hideous place not so confined

By rigor
⁶⁶¹⁹
unconniving
⁶⁶²⁰
but that oft,

Leaving my dolorous
⁶⁶²¹
prison, I enjoy

Large liberty to round
⁶⁶²²
this globe of earth,

Or range
⁶⁶²³
in the air, nor from the Heav’n of Heav’ns

Hath He excluded my resort
⁶⁶²⁴
sometimes.

I came among the Sons of God when He

Gave up into my hands Uzzean
⁶⁶²⁵
Job,

To prove
⁶⁶²⁶
him, and illustrate
⁶⁶²⁷
his high worth.

And when to all His Angels He proposed

To draw the proud King Ahab
⁶⁶²⁸
into fraud,

That he might fall in Ramoth,
⁶⁶²⁹
they demurring,
⁶⁶³⁰

I undertook that office, and the tongues

Of all his
⁶⁶³¹
flattering prophets glibbed
⁶⁶³²
with lies

To his destruction, as I had in charge.
⁶⁶³³

For what He bids I do. Though I have lost

Much luster of my native brightness, lost

To be beloved of God, I have not lost

To love, at least contemplate
⁶⁶³⁴
and admire,

What I see excellent in good, or fair,

Or virtuous.
⁶⁶³⁵
I should so have lost all sense.

“What can be then less in me than desire
⁶⁶³⁶

To see thee and approach thee, whom I know

Declared the Son of God, to hear attent
⁶⁶³⁷

Thy wisdom, and behold thy godlike deeds?

Men generally think me much a foe

To all mankind. Why should I? They to me

Never did wrong or violence. By them

I lost not what I lost. Rather by them

I gained what I have gained, and with them dwell

Copartner in these regions of the world,

If not disposer
⁶⁶³⁸
—lend them oft my aid,

Oft my advice by presages
⁶⁶³⁹
and signs,

And answers, oracles, portents, and dreams,

Whereby they may direct their future life.

“Envy, they say, excites me, thus to gain

Companions of my misery and woe!

At first it may be but, long since with woe

Nearer acquainted, now I feel by proof

That fellowship in pain divides
⁶⁶⁴⁰
not smart,
⁶⁶⁴¹

Nor lightens aught each man’s peculiar
⁶⁶⁴²
load.

Small consolation, then, were man adjoined.
⁶⁶⁴³

This wounds me most (what can it less?) that man,

Man fall’n, shall be restored, I never more.”

To whom our Savior sternly thus replied:

“Deservedly thou griev’st, composed
⁶⁶⁴⁴
of lies

From the beginning, and in lies wilt end,

Who boast’st release from Hell, and leave to come

Into the Heav’n of Heav’ns! Thou com’st indeed,

As a poor miserable
⁶⁶⁴⁵
captive thrall
⁶⁶⁴⁶

Comes to the place where he before had sat

Among the prime in splendor, now deposed,

Ejected, emptied, gazed,
⁶⁶⁴⁷
unpitied, shunned,

A spectacle of ruin, or of scorn,

To all the host of Heav’n. The happy place

Imparts to thee no happiness, no joy,

Rather inflames thy torment, representing

Lost bliss, to thee no more communicable—

So never more in Hell than when in Heav’n.

“But thou art serviceable to Heav’n’s King!

Wilt thou impute t’ obedience what thy fear

Extorts, or pleasure to do ill excites?

What but thy malice moved thee to misdeem
⁶⁶⁴⁸

Of righteous Job, then cruelly to afflict him